


Atlas and Hercules

by taylor_tut



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M, Sick Character, Sick Lance, Sickfic, sick keith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-24
Updated: 2017-04-24
Packaged: 2018-10-23 16:27:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10722996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taylor_tut/pseuds/taylor_tut
Summary: From a prompt from my tumblr: Lance and Keith are sick at the same time. They both end up going on a mission anyway. It doesn't end well.





	Atlas and Hercules

Keith could always tell when something was off with about Lance by his music. Under normal circumstances, a day of castle chores would involve blasting loud, trashy music that Keith hated, and sulking when Keith asked him to turn it down. Today, however, Keith was slightly grateful for the silence, but it worried him a bit, too.

“What are you thinking about?” Lance asked from where he was mopping the floor across the room from Keith, who was polishing weapons. This was their punishment for wandering off on the previous day’s mission, Keith knew, but deserving it didn’t make it suck any less. 

“You,” Keith answered honestly. Lance hesitated for a moment, then turned bright red. 

“What about me?” he asked teasingly. 

“You’re not playing Shakira,” Keith blurted. This time, Lance stopped mopping entirely, surprised by the observation.

“Oh, yeah. I noticed.”

“Why not?” Keith asked.

“Don’t think you’re the only observant one, _mullet_ ,” Lance drawled, “I know you’ve got a headache. You’ve been rubbing at your temples all morning.” Keith blinked owlishly. He _did_  have a headache, but it wasn’t something he was too worried about. 

“You’re doing chores in silence for me?” Keith clarified astonishingly, and Lance nodded. “Thank you.” The blue paladin’s eyebrows rose in mock-incredulity. 

“You’re thanking me for something?” Lance echoed. “You must be worse off than I thought,” he jested, “Do you have a fever?” But when he placed his hand on the red paladin’s forehead to observe, he was surprised by what he found.

“God damn it,” Lance cursed. “You do have a fever.” 

“Your hands must be cold,” Keith objected, but Lance was already leading him to his room by the wrist. There, Lance situated him in his own bed, though not without protest from Keith, and told him to wait there while he found a thermometer. 

“I’m surprised they even have these old under-the-tongue mercury thermometers,” Keith spoke around the glass tube.

“Shut your face; you’ve still got a minute left on it,” Lance scolded, “And technically it’s dyed alcohol.”

“When did you get so smart?” Keith asked sarcastically. 

“Pidge taught me that,” Lance beamed, and Keith’s heart melted just a bit. Lance took the thermometer from Keith’s mouth and read it in the light.

“101.1,” Lance said aloud.

“That’s barely anything,’ Keith protested.

“But it’s not nothing,” Lance argued. Suddenly, the alarms started to blare. 

“Paladins,” Allura’s voice came through the emergency speakers, “Gather in the commons.”

Keith made to stand, but Lance shoved him back down in his bed. 

“Lance, I’ve got to–”

“No, Keith,” Lance’s voice was firm. “I’ll tell Shiro you’re sick, but you’re not going out there with a fever. You could get hurt.” Lance turned quickly and jogged to the door. “I’ve got to go, but I’ll keep you in the loop, okay? Get some rest.”

__________________________________________________________

 

“Where’s Keith?” Shiro asked, “Wasn’t he with you?” All eyes fell upon Lance. 

“He’s sick,” Lance replied. “We’re going to have to do this without him.”

Pidge looked nervous. “What if we need to form Voltron?” she asked. 

“We’ll manage,” Shiro said, sounding much more confident than he felt. Really, his plan was just to hope that it didn’t come to that. To do what they always did, what he was best at: make due with what little they had in a shitty situation.

Lance ignored the beginning of a dull headache as he ran to his Lion, despite the ominous feeling that something might go drastically wrong. There was no way that they would manage without two of their paladins, after all, and even if he was coming down with what Keith had, he was sure he’d be able to manage for one mission.

Right?

Zarkon had abandoned prisoners on a very, very hot planet that Lance didn’t bother to remember the name of. 

For the record, Shiro knew it might be a trap. It sounded like a trap. More than likely a trap.

But what were they supposed to do? Just leave these aliens to die there? Without rescue, they’d only survive a day, tops, and that was if there were no injured or ill prisoners. Shiro knew better than to hope for that.

“Lance, you’re in charge of watching our backs,” Shiro instructed. “When we land, we’re going to do our best to get the prisoners into our lions as quickly as possible, but we’ll still be vulnerable. You’re our sharpshooter. If anyone comes close, you take them out.”

Shiro’s voice was stern and serious. While Shiro was _always_  stern and serious, the undertones were usually gentle and warm, but not right now. His voice was metal and the color of gunpowder. 

“You okay, Shiro?” Lance asked. Shiro nodded wordlessly. His eyes were fixated on the planet’s surface as the four paladins guided their lions in for a landing. 

Immediately, Shiro, Pidge, and Hunk took off toward the prisoners. The race of aliens the Galra had released here were small, and to Shiro’s relief, many of them were in fair enough condition to walk to the lions themselves. 

But many of them weren’t.

They were small enough for even Pidge, with some effort, to piggyback to the safety of the lions, but the going was slow, and the heat wasn’t doing anyone any favors. 

Most of all Lance.

He wished that he could take his helmet off for just a moment to wipe his forehead; the sweat was dripping into his eyes and making it difficult to see. His patrol was diligent, and he could not allow himself the slow pace that the others were taking, hauling the injured victims to safety. Lance had to stay quick, steady. 

He flinched at every sound. Most of it was nothing, just the wind… was there wind on this planet? It sounded like there was an ocean nearby, but he realized that unless the planet’s ocean tides were conveniently timed up with his own heartbeat, that he might just be hearing the sound of blood thumping in his own ears.

It made things fuzzy, dull, and–

There was a sound.

A definite sound, not an ocean sound, or a heartbeat sound.

Rustling. 

Lance was ready with his bayard. He had already aimed to take out whoever was about to emerge, but his vision was blurring, and his hands were trembling. Was he shivering?

Shit, was Keith this sick, all alone in the castle? He distantly hoped not as he let his finger pull the trigger and fire two rapid shots at the approaching enemy.

“Lance, it’s me!” shouted a familiar voice. 

“Keith?” Lance damn near screeched. “What are you doing here?! You should be in bed!”

“I thought you might need the help,” he confessed sheepishly. “I’m really okay. The fever isn’t that high, and I don’t feel that bad.”

Lance’s mind was reeling. Keith should _not_ be here. Keith was going to get hurt here. Lance would not be able to protect him here.

“Lance,” Shiro’s voice now, from behind him, “I heard you shoot–Keith? I thought you were ill.”

“He _is_ ,” Lance said. 

“You shot at him?” Shiro asked, frantic now. If the sharpshooter shoots at you, the sharpshooter shoots you. If Lance points his gun at you, all you can do is hope that he doesn’t decide to pull the trigger. 

But he’d fired.

“He didn’t hit me,” Keith said. “Come to think of it, _why_  didn’t you hit me?”

“Are you complaining?” Lance muttered. 

“No,” Keith returned, “it’s just unusual for you to miss.”

Shiro clearly agreed. He was taking a step toward him, and though his vision was twisting and tunneling a bit, Lance knew that he had to do something.

So he lied. 

“I saw it was you at the last second,” he fabricated. It seemed to be enough for Keith and Shiro.

“Are you sure you’re feeling well enough to be here?” Shiro verified, looking at Keith with concerned eyes.

“I’m good,” Keith replied. “How can I help?”

“Stand guard with Lance. He’s looking a bit red in the face, and I think he could use the backup,” Shiro commanded, but Lance didn’t like that plan.

“No, you should help the others get prisoners to the lions. I’ll be fine here.”

Lance just wanted to go home. Anything that might speed up the process would be in his best interests. Plus, Keith was sick, and the task of pacing back and forth and potentially fighting off Galra made Lance worry. 

Lance would handle it on his own. He’d protect his friends. He’d protect Keith.

Turns out, it was a trap. 

Go figure.

As soon as all the prisoners were aboard, they took off, and hovering right around the corner were Galra ships waiting to attack.

“Allura, we need a wormhole!” Lance could hear Pidge shouting, but it didn’t seem to concern him, so he tuned it out.

His head was positively _pounding_. It was unbearable. 

Murkily, he realized that Keith might be feeling the same pain.

“Mullet,” he breathed into the headset, his voice sounding raspy and dark, “How’re ya doin’?”

Keith didn’t seem to notice his struggle. “I’m fine,” he replied. He sounded congested and maybe even a bit out of breath, but focused. That was all Lance needed to hear. He relaxed into his seat. The wormhole opened in front of them, but Lance had closed his eyes for the marginal relief that it brought him. He was so tired, and they were almost home. 

“Pull up, Lance,” Shiro’s voice came booming through the headset suddenly, “Pull _**UP**_!” 

Lance couldn’t see. The pain was blinding, and he couldn’t stand to keep his eyes open.

Blearily, he reached out and smashed the autopilot button, knowing that there was no way in hell he’d be able to fly his lion away from whatever it was Shiro was so concerned he’d hit.

Blue’s very nearly missed the wormhole, but once she was in control, was able to adjust quickly and navigate through it. The maneuver had been jerky, and had looked clumsy, but she didn’t care. What mattered now was that her paladin was ill. She could feel the heat of his body, and the immense pain that he was in. Her pilot was too ill to care for himself, and he’d just relinquished control to her.

The other paladins were yelling at her pilot. It irritated her, at first. Clearly, he was unwell. Lance was the most dedicated, tenacious pilot she’d ever had. He’d sacrifice his life for any of the others in a heartbeat, so why were they assuming that he’d allow himself to lose focus so clumsily if he were well?

However, it wasn’t until she could feel him tense in pain at the noise that she grew truly angry with the others.

Prisoners or not, they needed to protect their own cub, first. 

She landed. It wasn’t planned, and it wasn’t convenient, and it was in the middle of nowhere. 

The other paladins, surprisingly mostly Keith, were yelling into the comms angrily. They were shouting about following orders and taking this seriously and not fooling around, and it was enough to take her pilot’s migraine over the top. He muted his comm and shoved off the helmet to get sick in the cockpit. 

“Lance?!” Shiro called, to no avail. “He turned off his comm.”

“I’m going to kill him,” Keith muttered under his breath. The other Lions lined up to join Blue in the field she’d landed in and sprinted toward the Blue lion. Her door was open until she saw their angry expressions and heard them shouting for Lance to come out and explain himself. 

Hell no.

“Woah!” Pidge exclaimed, stumbling backward as Blue’s force field activated right next to her face. “Let us in, Blue,” she demanded, pounding on the shield.

 “You can’t protect Lance from trouble that he brings on himself,” Keith added. Lance stumbled out of the cockpit in a daze, feeling drunk and heavy.

“Lance?” Shiro breathed. The kid looked terrible. He was pale and with bright red cheeks, and he’d stopped sweating. Lance staggered down from the lion and onto the ground, and Blue let her force field down just as he collapsed forward. Shiro reached him just in time to prevent his face from hitting the ground.

“He’s burning up,” Shiro worried. His eyes flickered to Keith, who was clearly sick with the same bug, and motioned for him to step forward. Were they both this ill?

Shiro pressed his palm to Keith’s forehead and sighed. Warm, but not… not like Lance. 

“I’ll take him back in my lion,” Keith offered. 

“You’re sick, too,” objected the black paladin. 

“But Red is the only lion not filled with prisoners. I can take him straight to the castle.” Shiro hesitated, hating that this plan made sense, but finally nodded when he realized that it was the only choice they had. Making due always sucked. 

“You absolute dumbass,” Keith whispered fondly as he helped Lance into Red and pressed his own autopilot feature to guide them back to the castle. 

“You love me,” Lance smiled sloppily, and Keith rolled his eyes. 

“Doesn’t mean you’re not in big trouble.”

Lance winced a bit. “Yeah, I kinda figured.” Keith wished he had something to bring down the fever with. God, he was boiling.

“Why would you go out there like that? After you lecture me on staying in when I’m sick?”

“Don’t act all high and mighty,” Lance’s voice hardened, shocking Keith. “Don’t act like you don’t understand why I did it. You snuck out. You knew you were sick, and I told you I’d handle it, and you snuck out.”

“I just–”

“You ‘ _just’_ didn’t trust me to take care of things. You think that unless you make these grand, sweeping sacrifices, that the whole world is going to fall apart. Do you have any idea how pretentious that is?”

“I don’t–”

Lance interrupted again. He was so tired. “You do; you all do. All of you, save for Hunk, bless him, think that everything rests on your shoulders. And maybe it does. You, Shiro, Pidge, you’ve all got these bigger purposes, these destinies and these goals… I don’t have that. Me and Hunk, we’re just normal.”

“You’re not just ordinary, Lance,” Keith argued, “You’re part of Voltron. You’re the Blue paladin. You’re not replaceable.”

“I am, though. And I accept that. The universe continues to expand if I’m not in it, and good things and bad things continue to happen whether I intervene or not. But you’re not like that. You’ve got to hold up the sky on your back. Like Atlas. You’re the hero of the story, and I’ve go to keep you safe. Like Hercules. He’s a hero for that, too, in his own way.” Lance was fading now, his energy drained from the outburst, and Keith could tell that he just wanted to sleep.

“Just get some sleep, Hercules,” Keith murmured. Maybe he didn’t have to hold up the sky all the time, but he figured that he could at least manage to carry Lance back to the castle. 


End file.
